Godspeed You Black Emperor! - Classic or Dud?

http://sphotos-h.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash4/419480_10151174813477779_580666827_n.jpg

these guys were massive at atp. first time i saw them. wish their records were remotely like their live show but then again i don't know how that'd translate to record exactly

i think the records are more than remotely like their live show

maybe i just want more heaving two note drones, less pretty guitar figures

fewer*

their albums are like movies that you would go to see once. and maybe leave halfway through.

'ALLELUJAH! DON'T BEND! ASCEND!

I always thought of this band as a swans or glenn branca for indie people but I still like GY!BE so this is great news. all this good rock music coming out this year... it's crazy.

predictions: endless crescendos + drum-machine

I am spectacularly excited!

someone in our office has heard this and says it's amazing and up there with the old stuff - he's a massive uberfan so take that with a pinch of salt but i'm looking forward to it.

It *is* the old stuff, though, right? The two long tracks are about a decade old, I think.

Yeah, they were doing them at live shows before Yanqui UXO came out.

(feel free to visualize urgent humping if you read this) i'm pretty pumped for this, although the things i appreciate about their musical output now are so different than what they were back in their heyday circa 2001. i used to be all about the buildup and the climax but now i find more pleasure in the meandering plateau passages.

its erm around

Hard to judge on first listens, but I'm relieved that it's not full of spoken word samples, anyway.

that was also what made the last one great as well, they had p much ditched the samples by then

seeing them tomorrow, happy to get a copy of this before everyone else

fuck me, this is awesome!

GYBE gives in and finally just cribs their album titles from Dr. Bronner labels.

lol

the best gybe record, easy

wish their records were remotely like their live show

hey they finally did it!

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbcebkQUGn1qdmmiqo1_500.gif

the best gybe record, easy

Yep. And can't help but notice that it sounds a bit like a streamlined version of the Swans record.

The second half of "We Drift Like Worried Fire" is pretty awesome

setlist tonight in bmore-

Hope Drone
Mladic
Monheim
Behemoth ?
New Song ?
One of the segue songs ?
The Sad Mafioso

This is an instrumental metal album so far!

short tracks are boring
long tracks - pleasure!
though i wonder if i can listen to post rock again in 2012

i dont think they'll ever top skinny fists. this record is coll but it's business as usual. the whole silent release thing was seriously blunted by the leak THE NEXT DAY. how depressing.

here's an article i wrote about godspeed's confused politics and how it softens the blow of their music: http://www.splicetoday.com/music/sins-in-the-corporate-almshouse

the whole silent release thing was seriously blunted by the leak THE NEXT DAY. how depressing.

i'm not sure that it's called a leak when it's already being sold at shows! ;) not commenting either way on what level of hell you end up at for leaking, just saying, it's not quite the same as some record industry insider leaking it 3 weeks before anyone else has heard it or whatever.

also, i agree that the efrim's more holy than thou attitude is irritating, but i never like the argument that, because one find examples of GYBE acquiescing to the corporate world, they're somehow exactly the same as corporate rock stars. i think i'm just a little more sensitive to that because i've had to endure drunk dudes criticizing me for not being a perfect environmentalist and then equating me with someone who owns 3 humvees.

lol whoops, "the efrim". maybe he is holy!

efrim addressed this point in an "open letter" eleven years ago...

anyone wants to punch holes in our politics, go ahead; you wanna say that we don't properly address the paradox of a "political" band making money off of compulsive shoppers or victims of fetish capitalism- guess what, YOU'RE RIGHT! we haven't properly addressed that paradox at all, and we know it and we kinda know why too- if you want to talk to us about that, then go ahead, give us a call, we'd love to talk about it (as long as you can hold up your end of the conversation, as long as you're willing to talk to us about you're own failings, confusions, or epiphanies in the face of this cruel cruel world...)

Streaming in full here: http://pitchfork.com/news/48130-stream-godspeed-you-black-emperors-new-album/

I haven't listened to this band in ~6 yrs...surprisingly the first track is "doing it" for me. Nice drone-y intro, pretty heavy throughout, and about as raw-sounding as it could be without detracting from the overall sound.

Really like the pseudo gamelan outro on Mladic so far.

this is so good
and so good for fall

Now realizing aforementioned pseudo-gamelan outro is likely recording of Montreal student protest drum circle type thing. Feel conflicted.

those protest were really amazing to witness/be a part of, not only students, all kinds of people, including families, in neighbourhoods around the city - and not drum circles but people banging (mostly) on pots and pans

felt a tinge of annoyance when whiney declared this their best because that is a much higher bar than he seems to think it is, but ... this is very, very good.

Chilling with the new one now for the first time. Sounding nice'n'doomy so far. Could definitely see myself listening to this.

Used to love Lift Yr..when I was an angsty 15 year old, stuck photocopies of the inlay booklet onto my GCSE art sketchbook and all that jazz. Classic stuff. And one of my first memories of one of my current housemates is him walking out from his old house into the pitch black garden solemnly intoning 'THE CAR IS ON FIRE, AND THERE'S NO DRIVER AT THE WHEEL' out of nowhere. Halcyon days.

Really like the record...

taking bets on how long it is before i reverse field and admit whiney might've been right

Workin on a review to clarify my point, plz hold

I'm not sure this is their best album, but I think the first track might be their best song.

^^^100% agreeing with this right now.

It's really good, but I miss the more chamber-like movements. Everything on the new one sounds like it was composed to be played live with 9 people.

Mladic is just glorious.

it is. always been a huge fan but I think that song tops Moya as their best song.

"Mladic" is the retitled "Albanian", right? Been listening to this lot since the last century and I still can't get a fucking song title right in my head.

Would really help if they stopped changing the names. Or using fucking DATES as song titles.